On Thu, 30 Mar 2017 18:32:45 -0000 (UTC), Bill
wrote:

wrote:
On Thu, 30 Mar 2017 11:58:44 -0400 (EDT), justan wrote:

Wrote in message:
On Thu, 30 Mar 2017 08:39:39 -0400 (EDT), justan wrote:

Without going into details, powerline hits can cause unpredictable
things to happen. Recovery can be easy or it can be
difficult.

Power hits can be fairly easily mitigated if you have decent surge
protection and UPS. Working with 1000 customers who refused to turn
off their computers and unplug them every afternoon when we had a
thunderstorm got us pretty good with surge protection. Most of that
knowledge world wide came from Florida.


The only recent hardware failuresI could attribute to powerline
are a gfi outlet and a device that had some operational issues
even after a factory reset and reconfiguration. The only surge
protection we have is built into the mains panel. Most of my
devices are inexpensive and easily replaceable. I can't justify
the cost of individual surge protectors.

Surge protection goes farther than simply plugging in a few
protectors. For most of the country, that may work for you but we get
an ass kicking thunderstorm just about every day for half the year.


Our biggest problems in the 80's was Colorado. Lots of lighting, and the
disk controller we had had a **** power supply. Pass transistors that
passed ever line glitch through.

We never really had a problem in the computer room. It was always cash
registers, ATMs and remote terminals that got fried. Pretty much
anything with a wire coming in from outside or long unprotected wires
in the building.
Motels, mall stores with multiple locations in the mall and terminals
running between buildings were the worst.

wrote:
On Thu, 30 Mar 2017 18:32:45 -0000 (UTC), Bill
wrote:

wrote:
On Thu, 30 Mar 2017 11:58:44 -0400 (EDT), justan wrote:

Wrote in message:
On Thu, 30 Mar 2017 08:39:39 -0400 (EDT), justan wrote:

Without going into details, powerline hits can cause unpredictable
things to happen. Recovery can be easy or it can be
difficult.

Power hits can be fairly easily mitigated if you have decent surge
protection and UPS. Working with 1000 customers who refused to turn
off their computers and unplug them every afternoon when we had a
thunderstorm got us pretty good with surge protection. Most of that
knowledge world wide came from Florida.


The only recent hardware failuresI could attribute to powerline
are a gfi outlet and a device that had some operational issues
even after a factory reset and reconfiguration. The only surge
protection we have is built into the mains panel. Most of my
devices are inexpensive and easily replaceable. I can't justify
the cost of individual surge protectors.

Surge protection goes farther than simply plugging in a few
protectors. For most of the country, that may work for you but we get
an ass kicking thunderstorm just about every day for half the year.


Our biggest problems in the 80's was Colorado. Lots of lighting, and the
disk controller we had had a **** power supply. Pass transistors that
passed ever line glitch through.

We never really had a problem in the computer room. It was always cash
registers, ATMs and remote terminals that got fried. Pretty much
anything with a wire coming in from outside or long unprotected wires
in the building.
Motels, mall stores with multiple locations in the mall and terminals
running between buildings were the worst.


We lost Macy's California Point of Sale terminals to IBM because your sales
guy was smarter. Our sales guy tole Macy's that the data lines had to go
via conduit because of the fluorescent lights. IBM guy said their did not
need conduit. He knew the fire department required conduit. Smarter.

On Thu, 30 Mar 2017 19:56:37 -0000 (UTC), Bill
wrote:

We lost Macy's California Point of Sale terminals to IBM because your sales
guy was smarter. Our sales guy tole Macy's that the data lines had to go
via conduit because of the fluorescent lights. IBM guy said their did not
need conduit. He knew the fire department required conduit. Smarter.

That must be a California thing. If you use plenum rated cable,
properly supported, I know of no fire reg that requires conduit for
low voltage ... and we never had a problem with fluorescent lights, in
spite of the urban legend that would not die. All of our signal cables
were balanced pairs, pretty much immune to the switcher in an
electronic ballast. Sixty hz was never a problem (magnet ballast). I
had 100' of UTP Cat 5 coiled above my desk right on a fluorescent and
I could patch it into any LAN, 3270, S-loop or whatever at the panel
to prove it to the non believers.
You could also watch the data going by on a scope if you wanted.
There were lots of urban legends that got dispelled in the late 80s
when IBM got serious about selling data cabling, LAN management and
communication contracts. Some of us went to school on it. They had a
very cool lab in Dallas where we could learn about just about anything
that goes down a wire. That part was mostly how to do the phone
company's job (breaking the finger pointing tie). That was followed up
by BICSI training for the guys like me who were actually trained for
writing wiring contracts.